Success or failure that seems to happen by chance, where chance is the arbitrary distribution of events or outcomes, outcomes or events being something that seems to happen by chance rather than as a logical consequence. Man and poker players’ resorts to explanations of a mystical or unknown quality and quantity to try to account for times of unexplained fortune or misfortune. To try to give explanation to events, outcomes occurring, that we from our individualistic outlook, define as being “lucky” and to a lesser extent ‘unlucky’. Understanding the conditions that need to exist at the poker table, to produce circumstances leading to the outcomes or events humans refer to as unlucky or lucky would give any poker player, a tremendous advantage. But in the words of Reverend John H. Holmes, “The universe is not hostile, yet nor is it friendly. She is merely indifferent.” She gives up her secrets grudgingly to the perceptive, opens the door to let the light shine on the answers for the briefest moments of existence meant to tantalize those desiring the knowledge and skill to understand how to ride the ebb and flow of lady-luck’s natural rhythm during a poker game.

Lady-luck comes in two forms as poker players will all attest too, good and bad, but the idea that she favours one individual over another in the war between order and chaos occurring in the universe. That the player across the table with most of your chips has a connection with lady-luck you’re not blessed with and this is the reason they keep catching cards on the turn or river. That their blessed with what poker players call ‘good luck’ and your blessed with ‘bad luck’, is an idea born of the way your mind responds to losing hands at the poker felt, not of any actual bias on the part of the universe. This is an emotional reaction to events occurring at the felt, but is the moment when individual choice can affect every hand you play in the future. If you make the choice to understand and study this moment, and each moment as an individual event that can never be repeated (no two hands of poker can ever truly be the same) then the only constant is the emotional reaction of the player to the situation.

The human mind is extremely complex in the way it responds to stimulus from the environment surrounding it, it’s reactions to stimulus from the environment are just as genetically ingrained and complex as its nervous-response to stimulus, so the way your mind responds to losing is far more important to the over all poker-war, then the hands you win chips with. This may seem idiotic to some, since chips are the ultimate goal in winning poker, but individual winning hands don’t usually determine the war, while one bad-beat can stick in your mind and determine your strategy of play for the remainder of the tournament. The eventual out come of any war, this includes poker, is determined by how you as a combatant react to the losing hands in the confrontation, handling winning is easier for sure, but to pick yourself off the field of battle and muster your remaining chips to victory takes emotional control. The best players are cool, sometimes you would have trouble knowing whether there winning or losing, their demeanour stays constant through out the tournament, they just ride the waves they know are coming, hoping to reach the final table. If one understands the genetic tendencies of the newest primate evolutionary development, the human mind, then one can choose to ignore the emotions one feels at these flight or fight moments and use the mind to think your way through the moment with what well call a thalamic moment.

Poker directly manipulates adrenalin filled emotions of risk and reward, fight or flight, inherited from ancestors who were the survivors of the primates war with nature, in essence were all the descendents of individuals who were successful in the risk and reward, fight or flight world in which our ancestors lived and therefore poker players of a sort. Texas Hold’em is the Cadillac of poker games to many, in poker the skilled player can successfully use the primate’s nervous reactions to get them to take the flight option in the battle between poker predator and prey, to fold the best hand and take flight in the face of what their emotions is telling them is a bigger poker hand, in comparison to their own cards. While these emotions allowed primates to survive their battle with nature’s predators, at the poker table this ancient survival instinct is a liability until you understand human nature. Once understood, this tendency in humans can be used as a weapon to improve your chances of winning in tournament play, or any time you sit down at a poker table.

How does this translate to poker, this is the tool aggressive players use when they bet scare cards on the flop, turn or river. The natural tendency of the primate is to take flight in a situation where all their chips are at risk because of these genetically inherited survival tactics that allowed your ancestors to survive their war with nature. The poker tournament is analogous to the relationship between predators in nature, one predator will always back down from a predator it sees as stronger, and this can translate to human reactions during poker, provided you can play the part of the alpha predator. When a poker player is cornered, this is analogous to being down to an amount of chips in relation to the blind which leaves the player a few rounds or less before being out of chips. In this situation the poker-primate’s reaction is to attack as it would be in nature, often with cards they might not otherwise play, and as often is the case in nature they succeed in backing a bigger predator down and surviving.

All players go card-dead, this is just the randomness of the universe not luck, occasionally for extended periods of time, changing your style of play to a style more in tune with the universe during these times will help. Learning to recognize when the random nature of the universe is not in tune with your energy cycle and to take a break from poker or to take a step back from the table for a few minutes could be a good way to get control of your emotions after a few bad hands, and maybe the cosmic cycle will shift while you think it through.